


Those Who Trespass

by Mimnerme1860



Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: Abuse of Authority, M/M, Protectiveness, Sexual Harassment
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-05-11
Updated: 2015-08-14
Packaged: 2018-03-30 02:09:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 6
Words: 20,486
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3918907
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mimnerme1860/pseuds/Mimnerme1860
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fill for the Daredevil Kink Meme.</p><p>During his internship at Landman and Zack, Foggy wants to do a good job, learn as much as he can, and maybe get a leg up on the career ladder. But when one of the partners at the firm takes a disconcerting interest in Matt, Foggy's list of priorities narrows to just one: keep Matt safe.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Gaze

1.

Foggy first sees it when, two weeks into their internships, they sit in on their first conference with the partners. The case matter was relatively simple and routine (hence the fact that the interns were allowed anywhere near it), but it was also for a very important client, and so it was deemed necessary that both of the partners be present at the meeting. It meant that there was almost as little work for the partners to do as for the interns; but while Matt and Foggy were experiencing this sort of meeting for the first time, the partners were well accustomed to the procedures, and so their attention could afford to wander. 

The first time Foggy looked over at the partners was about 20 minutes into the meeting, while the client’s representative, Jacqueline Marsh, was going over information that Foggy had run through the photocopier about seven hundred times. Anthony Landman, raised in Georgia and educated at Columbia Law--a significant reason for Columbia’s high placement rate at his firm--appeared to be politely listening to the proceedings, and was even taking notes, as though he had a real concern for the outcome of the case. He was a large man, talkative and jovial, combining a brilliant legal mind with an appealing and approachable demeanor.

Thomas Zack, by contrast, was all sharp edges and stark lines, hard and lean and ruthless. He had lived in the city until leaving for school, but he had returned determined to establish himself as a lawyer in his own city. His ambition and relentless effort had led to his rapid advancement through the ranks of the firm which now bore his name; though he was over a decade younger than his partner, he was the one who inspired fear and reverence in the halls of the office and of the court. There were many stories--most of them embellished, his coworkers assured him--of witnesses being compelled to cooperate merely through exposure to his marmoreal stare.

Today, he was applying that infamous gaze, but not in an effort to simulate attentiveness to the meeting. Foggy had thought at first that he was looking at Jacqueline while she was speaking; but his sightline actually ran a little lower, a little further to the left, down the table to the opposite corner, where the interns were sitting: he was staring at Matt. 

Matt was sitting next to Foggy, between him and their attorneys, keeping notes on his braille writer while politely keeping his face turned towards the speakers--and towards Zack’s gaze. Foggy saw Zack watching as Matt took a drink of water--his hooded eyes following the glass to Matt’s lips, then following the motion of his throat as he swallowed. He seemed to restrain a smile as he leaned back in his chair, crossed his legs; and then his eyes met Foggy’s, and Foggy immediately looked back to his notes. The consciousness of Zack’s heavy gaze weighed on his mind, forcing his attention away from the meeting he was meant to be absorbing. Again and again he found himself looking back towards the partners at the end of the table, and each time he found Zack’s piercing gaze at his friend’s throat, on his mouth, on his hands at the keyboard. 

Then suddenly, the defendants were standing up, and so were their attorneys and so was Matt, who reached behind himself to stretch out his back while unseen eyes raked over the line of his front. 

“Well, that was an adventure,” Matt said, turning to Foggy. Zack stood as well, taking one last lingering look at Matt’s back before he turned and left the room after the opposing counsel. “I’d say that we deserve at least one coffee each for surviving our first pre-trial conference.”

“Uh-huh,” Foggy agreed blandly, watching as the others filed out of the conference room.

“Come on, don’t tell me you’re not excited about coffee. I know it wasn’t the world’s most exciting meeting, but I didn’t realize that it was quite so boring as to make even you look down on a cup of joe.”

“No, it’s fine. You’re right, let’s--let’s go get some coffee, that sounds great,” Foggy said, finally standing to shakily organize his notes.

Matt frowned. “Foggy, is everything alright? You seem nervous.”

Foggy looked behind Matt to check that the room had emptied--but Jacqueline was still there, putting her papers in order. “No, I’m alright. I think it was just--uh, vicarious nerves. Coffee will help. Let’s go get coffee.”

Matt still looked concerned. “Alright, I’ll go grab the mugs if you--”

“You know what? Why don’t we go to the place across the street? I’ll pay,” Foggy offered. He wanted to get out of the office.

Then Matt smiled. “Well, if you’re going to insist on paying for unnecessarily fancy beverages, then I suppose I can let you buy me one,” he said, his tone inviting a witty reply that Foggy wasn’t prepared to give.

“Right,” was all he was able to say as they started out. Foggy pretended not to see Matt’s face fall before he followed.

Suddenly, the walk to the elevator seemed a minefield where danger could present itself at any moment. Zack could still be on the floor--what if he came around the corner, surprised them, insisted on being introduced to the new interns? Would he shake their hands, to have the chance to touch Matt? Would he linger too long, lean in to whisper in Matt’s ear? Would Foggy stop him if he did?

But maybe, Foggy thought as they were waiting for the elevator to arrive, he had walked the clients out, and would be just now coming back up on the elevator that they were about to enter. What if his hands wandered as he brushed past them getting out? Or if he came up with some excuse to get Matt to follow him up to his office, while Foggy waited helplessly?

The elevator doors opened with a ping and expelled a janitor. As they entered, Foggy felt cold beads of sweat rolling down his back. They rode the elevator down, and Foggy tried to relax, but each time he looked at his friend--his model-gorgeous, trusting, _blind_ best friend--he saw those rapacious eyes and his stomach clenched.

“Foggy,” Matt began after a tense silence, “are you sure that you’re alright?” And of course Foggy was not sure of that at all, and at that moment he couldn’t possibly force a lie past the fear clogging his throat. There was another pause before Matt asked, “Is there something you want to talk about?”

Foggy swallowed heavily, then replied: “Coffee first.”

Matt nodded, said “Okay.” Then the elevator doors opened and they walked out towards the street.

Some of Foggy’s suffocating fear began to evaporate as they left the building and its occupants behind. Foggy tried not to think about their inevitable return. They ordered their drinks and settled at a table in the middle of the floor. The shop was busy, but Foggy was thankful to note that he recognized none of the people there as their co-workers.

“Okay, Foggy,” Matt said after they sat down, “what’s the matter?”

Foggy took a stuttering breath before he began. “Did you--did you notice anything strange about that meeting?”

“What do you mean strange? It was the first one I’ve ever been to, it was all pretty unfamiliar.”

“So you didn’t notice--” Foggy took a deep breath before continuing. “Zack was staring at you, for the whole meeting,” he said, his hands shaking. “Or maybe ‘leering’ is the right word for what he was doing.”

Matt’s face remained carefully impassive. After a pause, he carefully said, “Okay,” and then “Is that it?”

“Is that--what do you mean, ‘is that it?’ ” Foggy asked, incredulous but keeping his voice low.

“Look, Foggy,” Matt began, leaning across the table towards Foggy, “I can tell that you’re upset, but somebody just looking at me really isn’t a big deal. Women have to deal with things like this all the time. It’s sad, and unfortunate, but it’s not as though you can tell someone to stop seeing. It’s nothing to be worried about,” Matt reasoned in a calming tone.

Foggy stared at him, perplexed. “Matt, I get what you’re saying, but you didn’t see--you didn’t _see_ how this guy was looking at you! The only time I’ve ever seen a man look at someone like that is those assholes on the street who catcall women. It wasn’t normal looking, and coming from your _boss_ , it’s totally inappropriate!” Exasperated, Foggy leaned heavily back into his seat. “Don’t just act like it’s nothing,” he concluded pitifully.

“Are you sure that he wasn’t just distracted by the noise?”

“The--what?”

“The noise, from the braille writer. You know, like those girls in the library? Maybe he was upset by it,” Matt suggested flippantly, taking a sip of his drink.

Foggy couldn’t believe what his friend was saying. Could he really be blind to this, too? “Matt--”

“Foggy, I trust you, and I know that this has been really bothering you. But I don’t care if he looks at me, because ultimately it doesn’t matter,” Matt said. “I’ll keep doing my work, and he’ll keep doing his, and then in the Fall we’ll go back to school and it’ll be like it never happened,” he said calmly. Finishing off his drink, he continued: “Thank you for worrying about me, but I really think you’re overreacting.”

Foggy took a deep breath. Out here, with the sun shining in through the windows and that conference room with its wandering eyes over 50 floors above them, it was starting to seem like Matt might be right. As long as it was just looking, then nobody was really getting hurt. Surely the school would have warned them if there were any serious issues with the professionalism of the firm. Maybe he was overreacting, after all. But when he remembered seeing that implacable, hooded gaze tracing over Matt’s mouth again and again, and he thought he might be sick. He picked up his cup. “Okay, Matt. Whatever you say. Just--just please be careful, alright?” he said, swirling his untouched drink. “I don’t think I could handle it if you get hurt.”

Matt smiled softly at him. “Of course I’ll be careful. Don’t forget, I am capable of taking care of myself most of the time.” He stood up, reached for his cane, and said, “Now, are you going to drink that, or should I do it for you?”

Foggy halfheartedly smiled in return, still not fully reassured, and handed over his cup.


	2. Glasses

2.

It’s a few weeks later, about halfway through their internships, when Matt takes a lot longer than he should coming back from the bathroom. It’s not a terribly unusual occurrence--as interns, they are often asked to fetch or deliver things at short notice--but since that first time he caught Zack staring, Foggy’s been especially aware of Matt’s comings and goings, of where he is and for how long he’s there. Nothing had happened yet; but just last week, they had another meeting like the first--prying eyes, oblivious Matt, distracted Foggy--and his concern was brought straight back to its original level of panic. And so it is in relief that Foggy greets Matt when he returns, late but apparently unmolested:

“Hey, buddy! What banal and trivial task did they assign you today, my overqualified little gopher?”

“Just a coffee run,” Matt answers, closing the door of their supply-closet-cum-office behind him.

“They made the blind intern go on a coffee run alone? That seems a little harsh.”

“I guess they’ve been impressed by my thus-far-demonstrated ability to not drop files and stacks of paper, and decided that I was ready to graduate to liquids,” he said, sitting down at his desk.

“I dunno, it seems dangerous to me. That coffee’s not cheap, and neither are your suits. Or theirs, for that matter.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence, there, Foggy,” Matt said sarcastically.

“Well, when the inevitable happens, don’t come crying to me.”

“Sure, Foggy.”

Foggy contemplates the work he has to do--copying down a bunch of numbers, scanning documents for the appearance of an obscure legal term--and decides that he can afford to procrastinate for a bit longer. He leans back in his chair and says, “So, tell me--does anyone here have any especially fantastical coffee orders?”

“Well,” Matt replies, “Shirley Goldstein asked for a quad, but everyone else was pretty standard. Jacqueline wanted soy, and Mr. Zack wanted no foam, but I think that was about as strange as it got.”

Foggy hesitated for a moment. “You got coffee for Zack?”

“Yeah,” Matt says, “It was actually his idea to send me.”

Foggy’s brow furrowed. “Did you, like, go to his office and ask if he had anything for you to do?” Dear God, he hoped Matt wasn’t that stupid.

“No, he just ran into me down here, in the break room. The coffee pot was broken, so he said I should go to the place across the street and--”

“Wait a minute. Why was he down here?” Foggy asked.

“I don’t know, I didn’t ask him. Maybe he was checking on the coffee pot?”

Maybe Matt _was_ that stupid. He leaned forward again. “Matt, partners at law firms generally don’t worry about maintaining the coffee pots of the peons. They have people for that,” he said. “I’ve never seen him down on this floor except to attend meetings, and there aren’t any important ones today. So why was he down here?”

“I don’t know, Foggy, that’s his own business. Why do you care?” Matt was beginning to sound exasperated.

“Matt, do you remember what we talked about last time? You said you were going to be careful.”

“How am I not being careful?” Matt asked. “Nothing has happened. Nothing’s going to happen. I think that you’re just being paranoid.”

“I’m not being _paranoid_ , I’m being _careful._ There’s no reason for someone as high-ranking as him to just run into someone as low-ranking as you unless he specifically wants to, and Zack doesn’t strike me as the type to drink with the foot soldiers to boost morale. This is totally on the level of suspicious behavior.”

Matt reached under his glasses to rub his eyes. “Why do you have to assume that his intentions are bad? Maybe he just wants to give me something to do. Landman has been giving you jobs an awful lot lately, and you don’t see me accusing him of anything.”

“That’s different. Landman doesn’t look at me like a piece of meat.”

“I’m sure you’re exaggerating.”

“You wouldn’t be saying that if you could see him.”

Matt sighed. “Why do you keep seing the worst in people, Foggy? Can’t you try to see something good in him?”

“Like what?”

“Like that he’s a very good lawyer we could learn a lot from.”

“He can be a good lawyer and a terrible person. It’s happened before,” Foggy argued. “Sometimes the worst is all there is in people, you know? In situations like this, where you might get hurt, it’s sometimes safer to just assume.”

“Foggy, I can take care of myself. I’m not going to let him hurt me, so don’t worry about it anymore, okay?” Matt asked.

“I am way past the point of not worrying here, Matt. He has power over you, and if we aren’t careful, then he could have the chance to use it. Even if he’s not a bad person, and even if he doesn’t want to use the power he has, we have to remember that he _could_ , so easily. You have to watch your back around him,” Foggy concluded, then added a sincere “Please.”

“Alright, Foggy. Whatever you say,” Matt said, beginning to shuffle papers around on his desk. “Did Eric drop off that recording he wanted me to transcribe?”

Foggy sighed. That was apparently the end of that. “It’s over on your right.” Matt finds it and thanks him, and they work in silence for the rest of the day.

*

The next day is Friday, and in the late afternoon when half of the office has gone home early, Foggy is walking back from the filing cabinets that hold all of the old case files. The cabinets, whose contents nobody had ever gotten around to digitizing, are tucked away in an obscure corner of the floor because they are so rarely accessed these days. But Landman had needed to look up some minute point of ancient case history, and lucky for Foggy, he got to track them down instead of leaving early to beat the rainstorm that had been threatening all afternoon. He really hadn’t wanted to make the trip from the cabinets to Landman’s office twice, so he had decided to carry all of the requested files back at once. He was only now realizing that this had been a terrible mistake. The pile is treacherously stacked--he’s leaning back slightly so that the files rest on his chest rather than tipping forward--and they’re heavy, so his fingers are beginning to spasm. He’s about to set the pile down and rest for a minute when he turns the corner and sees them.

Matt is standing just outside the room with the talking copy machine, his cane in one hand and a pile of transcriptions in the other. Zack is facing him, crowding him against the wall and standing too close for Foggy’s comfort, and, from the way Matt’s smile is polite but strained, probably Matt’s too. Zack is smiling, saying something that Foggy can’t make out, and then he’s reaching towards Matt’s glasses. The hand holding Matt’s cane twitches, then his mouth, as though he wanted to slap the hand away, to tell him to stop, but decided against it; and then the glasses come off. Matt blushes, looks away, murmurs a complaint--he doesn’t even like letting Foggy see him without glasses some days--and then Zack is talking again, turning Matt’s face towards him with a forceful hand on his jaw; Foggy hears him saying “...such lovely eyes, you shouldn’t hide them,” then he’s leaning forward with hooded eyes and Matt’s grip is tightening on his cane.

Foggy trips, the files come tumbling out of his hands like dominoes, and then he’s on the ground cursing. “Foggy?” says Matt, who’s moving to kneel beside him, having moved away from Zack. “Hey, Foggy, are you alright?”

Foggy sits up, straightens his jacket, and sighs out “Yeah, I’m fine, it’s just these _fucking_ papers--”

“I would appreciate that you refrain from using such language in this office, Mr. Nelson,” Zack says sternly, standing before them with military rigor. “I expect that you’ll clean up this mess immediately.”

“Yes, of course,” Foggy says, “Right away.” He swallows. “I’m sorry,” he says, and then, belatedly, “Sir.”

Zack nods, then walks towards them. Foggy holds his breath. “Mr. Murdock, I believe that you dropped these,” he says, holding out Matt’s glasses in his hand.

“Thank you, Sir,” Matt says as he takes them, not lifting his eyes from Foggy and pretending not to notice when Zack drags his fingertips along his hand as it takes them. He stares at Matt for another moment while he puts his glasses back on, then turns on his heel and leaves them to their work. When he rounds the corner back into the main part of the floor, Foggy releases his breath in a tense exhale.

“...Do you need any help getting all this up?” Matt asks him. 

“No,” Foggy says as he starts to sort the scattered papers back into their files, “I need you to talk to me. What the hell was that?”

“You mean you tripping and--”

“You know that’s not what I mean,” Foggy says, handing Matt one of the files he’s finished. “I know you didn’t drop your glasses. I saw what he was doing. There’s no way you can tell me that’s normal boss behavior.”

Matt pushes his glasses further up the bridge of his nose. “It’s--it’s not--it’s not actually that uncommon; people wanting to see my eyes, I mean. I guess they’re just curious. Girls at bars do it a lot.”

“But aren’t girls at bars normally trying to sleep with you?” Matt’s holds his silence at that, and Foggy hands him another file. “Matt, you have to tell someone about this.”

“Foggy, nothing really--”

“Don’t try to tell me that nothing happened! Look,” he said angrily, gesturing down to the quivering files Matt’s holding, “your hands are shaking.” Matt’s hands tighten around the papers. “Matt, what he’s doing is not okay. It’s not _legal_. You have to report him.”

“Foggy, I don’t--” he began to say, then stopped when his voice broke. He clenched his hands tighter around the files and took a few deep breaths to calm the tremors in his arms. A moment later, he continued: “I don’t think that it’s going to be worth the time and effort it would take. Like I said--nothing happened. Nothing admissible, anyway. And look,” he said, taking another steadying breath, “I’m fine now.” He reached out and took two more files from Foggy, then smoothed out the whole pile he’d collected. Already his trembling had begun to fade. “And besides, I was always taught not to complain about every little thing that happens. This--what he just did--it really wasn’t a big deal. It’s not worth worrying anybody else about,” he insisted. “Sometimes it’s just better to bear with it until it’s over.”

Foggy stared at him and hated that Matt wasn’t wrong. He snorted derisively and said “Yeah, because that sort of attitude hasn’t _ever_ helped the Catholic church cover up sexual abuse.”

Matt froze and inhaled sharply. “ _Fuck_ , Foggy,” he said.

Foggy sighed heavily, and handed Matt two more files. “I’m sorry, that was low,” and Foggy knew it, had known it even while he was saying it. “But it’s true, Matt. If you don’t do anything, if you just grin and bear it like a good Catholic boy, then nothing will stop him from getting any worse.” Foggy gathered the last of the files together, gathered himself, and then stood up. “Please, just promise me that you’ll think about it.”

Matt picked up his cane and stood with his own pile. “Okay, Foggy,” he said, and even though it sounded more like appeasement than promise, Foggy will take what he can get. He hears a roll of thunder from outside, and then the beginning of a heavy downpour.

“Okay,” he says. “Now, could you help me carry these up to Landman’s office? I may have tripped on purpose, but that doesn’t mean that I wouldn’t have done it by accident.”

Matt gives a small smile, then says “Of course. Let’s go.”

*

Later that night, after the thunderstorm has passed and the setting sun is pouring brilliant color into his window, Foggy decides to call Marci. He closes the door, lays down in his bed, and waits until Matt has started cooking. The walls in the apartment are thin, and he doesn’t especially want Matt hearing this conversation.

“ _Foggy-bear!_ ” she says as she picks up. “ _I was wondering when you’d call!_ ” 

“Hey, Marci,” he says, turning the volume down on the phone’s speakers. “How are you doing?”

“ _Well,_ ” she begins, and then launches into the saga of her week. She’s a year ahead of the two of them, had this internship last year, will be working at the firm full-time in the fall. He hopes that she won’t be offended. He relaxes for a moment, closes his eyes and just listens to the cadence of her voice. She has been cat-sitting for a neighbor in the midst of her other duties, and she’s wondering if she is might be allergic. She went with her youngest brother to pick out furniture for his dorm room at Swarthmore. Her hairdresser wants her to go lighter. 

He hadn’t realized until right now how stressed he’d been the past few weeks. 

“ _Foggy-bear? Foggy? Are you still there?_ ”

He jolted to awareness. His room was bathed in a dim red. “Yes, Marci. Sorry.”

“ _Are you doing alright?_ ”

He hesitated, and decided to be honest. “No. I--I actually wanted to ask you something.”

“ _What is it?_ ”

He breathed deeply, contemplating how to start. “There’s this guy at work,” he began, keeping his voice low and listening to Matt running water in the kitchen next door, “and he keeps _looking_ at Matt. Like, in a creepy way. I happened to run into them today, and he was taking Matt’s glasses off to look at his eyes. I think he might have been about to try to kiss him. I think it really bothered him. But, he’s doing this Catholic thing, and he won’t admit that anything’s going on.” He paused. “I don’t know what I should do. I’m scared about what might happen to him,” he said, his voice catching.

“ _Oh, Foggy,_ ” Marci said consolingly. “ _Who is it?_ ”

“...A partner.”

“ _Zack?_ ”

Foggy closed his eyes, his stomach sinking. “Do I want to know how you knew?”

“... _There were stories. I wasn’t sure if I believed them--he has a pretty impressive record of urban legends, you know. I guess that now I know that there was some truth to that one._ ”

“Marci, what do I do?”

“ _Foggy, I want you to listen to me. I know that you’re upset and worried, but I don’t think you really have much of a case right now. It’s not a crime to just look at somebody, no matter how creepy you are. If--if something worse happens, then it might be worth getting him to file a complaint--or getting him to let you file a complaint--but obviously, it would be much better if nothing worse happens._ ” She paused. “ _So just, you know--keep an eye on him. Don’t leave him alone more than you have to, remind him to watch out for himself. And if anything else happens, write it down, so you have documentation if push comes to shove._ ”

“That’s it? That’s all I can do?”

“ _Yeah, I know. It sucks_.”

Foggy rolled over onto his side, pressing the phone to his ear. “It just--it makes me sick, when I think about what could happen. Or what could have happened. It was a total accident that I happened to see them today.” 

“ _But you did, and that’s what matters. Don’t worry about what’s already happened, Foggy. You’ll drive yourself crazy that way._ ”

He sighed. “I just wish we could be done with this already, you know?”

There was a rustle on the other side of the line. “... _Do you want to come over this weekend? Help take your mind off of it?_ ”

“I don’t know Marci.” He rolled back over, closed his eyes. “I don’t think so. Not right now.”

“ _Okay, maybe another time,_ ” she said, trying to mask her disappointment.“ _Get some rest, okay? Have Matt try to teach you how to meditate again._ ”

“Because that worked so well the last time,” he said, trying and failing to raise the energy to smile at her answering giggle. “Thanks, Marci. I love you. Goodnight?”

“ _Goodnight, Foggy_. _Love you._ ”

As Foggy hung up the phone and lay back in bed, he realized that the water had stopped running a while ago, and he couldn’t hear movement in the kitchen anymore. He hoped that Matt hadn’t heard anything. He watched the last bit of red travel across the floor of his room. A few minutes later, he got up, emerging from the semi-darkness of the evening into the light of their tiny living room. He found Matt on the sofa, holding a stack of papers but not reading them.

“Hey,” Matt said, turning his face towards him. “Dinner will be ready in about 20 minutes. How’s Marci?”

“She’s fine. I told her you were cooking, and she agrees with me that it’s embarrassing that you cook better than I do.” Matt smiled a little at that as Foggy sat down beside him. “Why did you turn the lights on?”

“I didn’t want you to trip again. You would probably break something in here that we don’t have the money to fix,” he said, smiling a little wider as he teased Foggy. Then his smile slowly faded until he tentatively started to speak again: “Foggy… It’s only a couple more months. Let’s just take it a day at a time. We’ll get through this, I promise.” He reached out to give Foggy’s hand a comforting squeeze. “Don’t worry about it too much. Okay?”

By now, Foggy was too tired to argue. “Okay, Mattie,” he said, squeezing Matt’s hand in return. Matt went back to his reading, and Foggy watched as his hands moved hypnotically over the sheets.


	3. Professional

3.

The following Sunday, they are eating an unusually leisurely breakfast of bagels and coffee from the place next door when Matt’s phone rings: “ _Landman and Zack. Landman and Zack._ ” 

A bagel freezes halfway to Foggy’s mouth. “Why are they calling you on a Sunday?”

“ _Landman and Zack._ ”

Matt listens to the phone with his face twisted in concern. “Maybe we don’t have to go in tomorrow?”

“ _Landman and Zack._ ” Foggy remains silent. Matt debates whether to be professional or to let the phone ring out. “ _Landman and Zack_.”

“You should probably answer it,” Foggy says.

“Yeah,” Matt says, but doesn’t move. 

“ _Landman and Zack._ _Landman and Za--_ ”

“Will you listen in? Just in case--so you can know if something’s up?”

“Of course.”

Matt nods, and hesitates another moment. “ _Landman and Zack_.” Finally, Matt answers the phone, putting it on speaker so that Foggy can hear.

“Hello? This is Matthew Murdock speaking.”

“ _Hello, Mr. Murdock?_ ” answers a woman’s voice. “ _This is Amanda._ ” She pauses, waiting for a response. “ _Uh… Mrs. Carson’s secretary?_ ”

Foggy and Matt both relax; Foggy returns to his bagel. Amanda is a cute post-grad from NYU who started at the firm at around the same time they did. She had been pining after Matt for weeks, although she hadn’t worked up the courage to say anything yet--but from the wolfish grin that Matt gave when he realized who was calling, it seemed like he knew anyway.

“Yes, Amanda, of course. I’m sorry,” he says yawning, “I’m not really awake yet. You caught me in bed. Do you--I’m sorry. Do you mind if I just get dressed before we talk?I just don’t really feel comfortable talking to a woman before I’ve put my shirt on.”

Foggy scoffs quietly and shakes his head while Amanda stutters on the other side of the phone. She says yes, of course, and Matt, still grinning, takes the opportunity to turn the phone off of speaker. He walks past Foggy towards his room, and Foggy whispers “ _Ass_ ” to him as he goes. 

Matt’s smile just widens, and as he walks down the hall, he says into the phone “Sorry, that’s better. Now what are you doing at work on a Sunday?”

Foggy shakes his head again at his friend’s remarkable ability to flirt in any given situation. While Matt finishes his conversation, Foggy finishes his bagel, and then tidies up the kitchen. He had been a bit of a slob in undergrad--not quite, but almost at the level of some of his friends who were in fraternities--but it quickly became obvious that maintaining such habits with a blind roommate would mean potentially taking into his hands responsibility for the continued healthy and unbroken operation of said roommate’s limbs. He had opted instead for the responsibility of keeping the floor clean of clutter and the room clear of potentially rotten foods. 

He sometimes wondered if Matt understood just how much Foggy continued to sacrifice for this friendship.

Matt wandered back into the living room later looking thoughtful, his hand trailing the wall. 

“Hey Matt,” Foggy said. “What’s the verdict? To date or not to date?”

“What?” Matt asked. “Oh,” he said, “I don’t know. Mrs. Carson broke her hip.”

“What? How did that happen?”

“She just fell down some stairs in her house. You know she’s not so young, but apparently she hasn’t reconciled herself to the fact that she needs to have things like guide rails yet.”

“Oh man. That’s rough,” Foggy said.

Matt paused, his lips thinning like they normally did when he was stressed or worried. “They want me to give her presentation in the debrief for the R.L.D. Group case on Wednesday,” he said. “Apparently, since I’ve been helping her with the research on it for so long, I understand it better than anybody else could learn to in three days.”

“Seriously?” Foggy whistled. “You get to give a real presentation, about a real case? This is, like, exactly the sort thing that made us want these internships in the first place! That’s great!” he said, taking Matt around the shoulders in a one-armed hug. But Matt’s expression didn’t budge from its tense expression. “This is great, right? Am I missing something?”

Matt inhaled cautiously and said, “Zack is the lead attorney on that case. The meeting will be with him, the clients, and two other attorneys.”

Foggy felt a familiar weight settle in his chest. “Oh. That _is_ a problem.”

“I think I should turn it down,” Matt said. “Better to be careful, right?” He smiled sadly, and Foggy discovered yet another new aspect of his hatred for Zack.

Foggy thought it over. “No, I think you should do it,” he said. Matt looked towards him in surprise. “I mean--the meeting is on Wednesday. After that, whoever’s going to replace Mrs. Carson on the case will take over and you won’t have to worry about it again, right?” Matt nodded in affirmation. “I’ll keep an eye on you, and we’ll both be really careful, and by the time Wednesday rolls around, you’ll knock their socks off with your presentation and earn yourself one hell of an evaluation and a ticket to your pick of jobs when you graduate.” 

“You don’t think I would be pushing my luck, doing that?”

“Honestly? Maybe a little,” Foggy admitted. “But the clients will be there in the meeting, and he wouldn’t risk anything in front of them. But if you let him intimidate you into backing out of this, then that means that he wins, and I just can’t stand the thought of that. This is the best opportunity either of us has gotten at this internship, or that either of us is going to get, and as your future law partner, it’s my responsibility to make sure that you don’t have to pass it up because of some idiot asshole who thinks he can mess with you.”

Matt was clearly tempted by his words, but he was still uncertain. “You promise you’ll help me out? That we can keep things under control?”

“Of course. I won’t let anything happen to you,” Foggy said. “I promise.”

Matt smiled at that. “Okay. I’m going to trust you on this one, Foggy. I’ll call Amanda back and let her know that I can do it.”

“Right,” Foggy agreed, smiling. “And don’t forget that, when you take her out, you need to go home with her, not the other way around. These walls are too thin for that shit.”

Then Matt grinned again. “Are you sure? I don’t think that she’d be too loud, is the thing.”

“It’s not her I’m worried about, buddy,” Foggy returned. “I have to _live_ with you.”

Matt blushed and shoved him. “Shut up. At least the girls I bring home don’t call me Foggy-bear.”

“Woah, okay, you were never supposed to find out about that. How did you find out about that?”

“Your phone isn’t as quiet as you think it is. Or else Marci is just really loud. Either way, your secret’s out, _Foggy-bear_.”

Now it was Foggy’s turn to blush. “Go make your call, you ass. Your future and my dignity are at stake!” Matt laughed, and kept grinning the whole way back to his room.

*

When they go back to work, it quickly becomes apparent that their precautions were unnecessary. Matt has far too much work to do for the presentation to leave their office, and this gives Foggy a convenient excuse to cover some of the work that would usually send Matt out into the treacherous waters of the office. Their worries about Zack are almost forgotten amid all of the extra work they both have those first few days.

Finally, the day of the meeting comes, and so, too, does the bi-weekly coffee run. Foggy volunteers, as he has done for Matt’s work all week; but Matt insists that he needs to get some fresh air before the meeting, and that he’d really like to go get the drinks himself. Foggy doesn’t protest much beyond that--Matt really hasn’t left the office except to go home since he got this assignment, and even when they do go home, he brings materials with him to study. Going out, even just across the street, could only be good for him at this point. So Foggy goes about his work as usual, and doesn’t worry about it again until he sees Matt coming back.

The floor of the office is bustling when Matt returns, and even though Foggy has the utmost confidence in Matt’s ability to handle both himself and coffee, he does not have as much confidence that the other people in the office will avoid making asses of themselves. He heads towards Matt, intending to help guide him safely through the rabble and to proactively prevent a trip to buy a new silk shirt. Unfortunately, he doesn’t make it in time. 

Some paralegal making a beeline for the closing elevator doors somehow manages to crash straight into him, even though Matt hears him coming and tries to get out of his way. Coffee spills all over Matt’s jacket and shirt, and stains darken the shirt’s blue fabric like the sudden clouds of a summer storm. The paralegal shouts a brief apology as he disappears into the elevator. Normally Foggy would be all over him for something like this, but right now, he has other things to worry about: Zack, as if from nowhere, is beside Matt, taking the drinks from him and examining the damage to his wardrobe. Foggy picks up his pace.

“Matt!” Foggy shouts as he approaches. “Oh man, that doesn’t look good,” he says, making a show of turning himself around Matt to look at the spills, interposing himself between Matt and Zack in the process. “Didn’t I tell you it was a bad idea to let them talk you into carrying coffee? But nobody ever listens to Foggy until it’s too late, do they? Now come on,” he said, putting a hand on Matt’s arm to guide him, “let’s go get you cleaned up.”

“Actually, Mr. Nelson, that won’t be necessary,” Zack said. “I actually have several spare articles in my office. I’m sure that we can find some replacements that will suit Mr. Murdock among those. Now Mr. Murdock, if you would just follow me…” he said, gesturing towards the elevator as if Matt could see it.

Foggy sifted his thoughts for a valid excuse. “But, Mr. Zack, we could never ask you to do something like that!” He struggled to come up with a valid counter-offer. “He can borrow my jacket. I don’t have to go to the meeting, so I’ll be fine with just a shirt.”

Zack ran his gaze rapidly up and down Foggy’s body. His eyes settled on Foggy’s, narrowing at the corners in a look that Foggy couldn’t help but feel was amused. “Mr. Nelson, I suspect that your jacket would be noticeably too large for Mr. Murdock. Our clients will be arriving shortly for the meeting this afternoon, and we all need to present our most professional image. Besides, he will obviously need a new shirt, as well.” 

Foggy looked at his friend. His face was drawn in the same tense expression it had worn for the past two days: thin lips, clenched jaw, knotted brow. But this time, there were beads of sweat forming at his temples, and his breathing was slightly elevated as the liquid slowly seeped through his shirt to his skin. His face was turned towards Foggy in a silent plea for help. 

Foggy looked back at Zack. If he got Matt up to his office, what could he do? What was the risk? Matt still had to give the presentation today, in just a couple of hours--surely Zack wouldn’t do anything that would risk unsettling him and potentially hurting the case. Foggy doubted that he would be so unprofessional. But there were plenty of things he could do, plenty of ways he could hurt Matt without leaving a mark on him--and if he ended up being shaky in the meeting, then it could always be explained away. Such jitters were only to be expected from an intern working his first case. Foggy didn’t doubt that Zack would be able to come up with an explanation--or even that he had already come up with several. He had them in a snare--Foggy couldn’t possibly deny that Matt’s clothes were ruined, and nothing he could propose would be a better source of a replacement than the one Zack had already offered. And all of this was happening in plain sight of the other people on the floor--lawyers, secretaries, a janitor. Foggy wondered if the paralegal who was in such a hurry to drop off his delivery knew what a problem he had caused, or if perhaps his delivery was just an excuse to create this very situation.

Foggy blinked, and the world returned to motion. “Of course, Sir. You’re completely right,” he said to Zack, and then turned to Matt.

“Foggy, what--” he began to say, looking shocked and concerned.

“Matt, I’m going to go with Mr. Zack to get you a change of clothes,” Foggy said. “You go get yourself cleaned up--if you hurry, you might be able to keep the stain from setting.” Matt stood frozen for a moment. “Go on, I’ll deliver them to you there in a couple of minutes. Hurry, there’s still time to save the shirt!” Foggy said, discreetly pushing Matt in the direction of the bathrooms, away from Zack.

Matt nodded. “Right. Okay. See you soon,” he said, then started walking briskly towards the nearest bathroom, trying to hold the wet fabric of his shirt away from his skin. 

Foggy withheld a victorious smirk as he turned around. “Mr. Zack?” he said expectantly. 

The amusement in Zack’s expression had grown. He looked at Foggy, his eyes piercing, and said “Of course. Come along then, Mr. Nelson.”

As Foggy followed him, he felt elated at having beaten Zack. Riding the elevator in silence, Foggy indulged in a rare moment of self-congratulation: _That’s right, you asshole_ , he thought, _just you try to get past us._

The door opened onto the hallway where the partners had their offices. Foggy had been up here several times while working with Landman, but he had yet to see Zack’s office. The floor was conspicuously empty after the bustle downstairs; it was emptier than Foggy had ever seen it, and the effect, considering what he suspected of Zack’s plans for the afternoon, was unnerving. 

Zack leads him through the waiting room, also totally empty. Foggy looks towards the vacant desk standing sentinel by the door to the office. “Where’s your secretary, Mr. Zack?”

“I cancelled my appointments today and sent her home. I was expecting to be involved in preparations for the meeting for most of the day.” Foggy nods, and feels another wave of pride and relief that he had kept Matt away from here.

Upon entering Zack’s office, Foggy is immediately struck by how dark it is. Where Landman’s office regularly has the curtains thrown open to let in the sun that shines through the windows in the morning, Zack has put up sable curtains that block most of the light from entering. Furniture of dark wood and black upholstery complement the wooden panelling of the walls. The light in the room is provided by a few warm reading lamps, strategically placed to create bright oases among the shadows. It reminds Foggy of an old library; or better yet, he thinks as he looks at the black leather couch in the back corner, of a psychiatrist’s office.

“...can’t be with him all the time…” he hears as Zack opens the door to a small closet.

Foggy snaps back into awareness. “W--what did you say, Sir?”

“I said, stains from _coffee and red wine_ ,” he clarified, turning to look at Foggy, “are some of the worst to remove. I doubt whether your friend will be able to do much with that shirt.”

Foggy looked askance at him, wondering if he really heard wrong the first time, or if Zack was merely toying with him. “Well, that’s too bad,” he said, uncertain about the nature of their conversation. “We can’t afford to buy very many sets of nice clothes, so he’ll probably be pretty upset if that’s the case.”

“Mr. Murdock can keep these clothes, if he likes,” Zack says, drawing one suit jacket from the collection in the closet. “And of course, the firm will pay for replacements.” He walked over to Foggy and handed him the jacket. “Just have him bring the receipts to me within the next week or so.”

Foggy took the jacket without breaking eye contact. “Sure. I’ll bring them up to your secretary.” He thought he saw the edge of a smirk as Zack turned, heading back to his desk. Foggy followed, and stood in front of the desk while Zack sat down and reached into the shadows to open one of the desk’s lower drawers.

“You’re good friends with Mr. Murdock, aren’t you?” Zack asked.

“Yes,” Foggy said, suddenly alert. “We’ve been roommates since we started going to school here.”

Zack smiled. “That’s good to hear. Most of the stories people my age hear about your generation are about how disconnected all of you are these days--from the world, from your families, from each other. It’s encouraging to hear that there are still some out there who value real personal interaction,” he said, finally pulling a shirt out of the pile in the drawer. His face was mostly hidden in shadow. “I’m glad that he has a good friend like you.”

Foggy tried to smile politely through his discomfort. “Thanks, I guess.”

Zack slid the drawer closed, but did not turn back to face Foggy. Instead he kept looking towards the side of the room, into the darkness of the far wall. “And what a fine young man he is, your friend. I don’t know that I’ve ever met someone so--” he paused, taking a breath. “--intriguing. I wonder: do you ever think about him the way I do? You must. _You’re_ not blind,” he said, leaning back into his chair and covering half of his smirking face in darkness. “Do you ever think of him on his knees? Or on his back, spread out beneath you? Begging you? Do you imagine running your hands over his skin? It must mark so easily,” he said, avoiding Foggy’s wide-eyed gaze. “Or perhaps you don’t have to imagine it. Tell me, are his lips as pretty wrapped around a cock as they are around his drinks? Do his eyes water when he swallows you down?” He smiles again. “ _God_ , how he must look when he cries--”

“Shut up,” Foggy says, seething with rage. “Shut the _fuck_ up!” he shouts, striking the desk with his palm. “Don’t you fucking say another word! I swear, if you touch him, I’ll fucking _kill_ you, you bast--”

“Language, Mr. Nelson,” Zack said, and suddenly the full force of his gaze, flashing in the low light, was on Foggy. “This is the second time I’ve had to warn you. And was that a _death threat_ I just heard?” he asked, feigning shock. The blood ran from Foggy’s face. “Mr. Nelson, you must know that this is grounds for immediate dismissal.”

Foggy’s hands trembled where they held the jacket. He could feel his blood bounding violently through the arteries of his neck, but his stomach was solid and cold as ice. “But--you were saying--”

“Mr. Nelson, I was helping you get your friend through an unforeseeable predicament when you suddenly and violently lashed out at me,” he said with smirking eyes. “And this isn’t the first time you’ve had trouble holding your tongue in the office. To be honest, I’m beginning to doubt that you possess the level of professionalism required for a career in the legal profession.”

Foggy closed his eyes and clenched his jaw. Of course, anyone to whom he tried to complain about this would immediately trust Zack over him, especially since he now had legitimate evidence against him. But if Foggy got fired--

“Of course, it would be a serious blemish on your resume to be fired from an internship at a firm as important as this one. You might never be able to get another interview. In fact, I can ensure that you don’t,” he said, gloating eyes adding what the blood rushing through Foggy’s ears was already whispering: _and who will protect your friend, then?_

“Please,” he said, his tongue clumsy with fear. “Please, Sir. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I can’t--I can’t lose this job. Please.”

Zack’s face was hard, implacable as the statue of some ancient deity. Then, suddenly, his features relaxed into a menacing smile. “Of course, I know that this is a difficult time in the life of a young person. So many things to worry about. What kind of man would I be if I couldn’t allow a young man a few indiscretions?” he said magnanimously. “You may have another chance.” 

Foggy let out a shaky breath. “Thank you, Sir,” he said sincerely, hating Zack all the while for playing him so easily. Zack held out Matt’s shirt to him like an offering, and Foggy moved forward to take it before he could change his mind.

But Zack kept his hold on the shirt even when Foggy grabbed it. He raised his eyes to meet Zack’s again. He said, “Now Mr. Nelson, I’m going to expect a significant improvement in your behavior from this point on. If you aren’t able to change your attitude then--” he paused, grinned predatorily “--then you had better hope that your friend begs prettier than you.” Zack released the shirt into Foggy’s clenching fingers as Foggy glowered at him murderously. “Now what do we say, Mr. Nelson?”

“ _Thank you, Sir_ ,” Foggy said laboriously through his teeth.

“You’re quite welcome, Mr. Nelson. You may go now,” Zack said, once again the picture of professionalism, as he gestured towards the door. Dismissed, Foggy turned slowly and marched to the door.

The way through the waiting room, the elevator ride, the walk to the bathrooms, they all blend together before Foggy’s eyes and suddenly he is in the bathroom and Matt is there, too. Matt looks up when Foggy enters, and he’s washing his shirt, is actually standing there in the company bathroom with his chest covered only by his stained suit jacket and “ _Do you imagine running your hands over his skin? ...Or perhaps you don’t have to…”_

Foggy just manages to make it into a stall before he vomits. The remnants of the egg sandwich he ate for breakfast and acidic dregs of coffee are suspended in the water like clouds, and Foggy heaves again at the sight. He vomits until there is nothing left to bring up, until the contractions of his stomach begin to feel like punches to the gut.

Once he can breathe again, he leans his head against the metal side of the stall, trying to cool his feverish skin. Matt’s hand finds his back and starts rubbing in comforting circles. “Foggy?” he says in a low voice. “What happened?

Foggy locates the crumpled clothing he’d dropped on the floor of the stall and painfully hands it to Matt. “I got you some clothes.”

“...Is there something on them? Do I need to check them for ipecac?”

“No,” Foggy groaned, “No, they’re fine, it’s just--he just--he said--some things.”

“What did he say?” Matt’s hand continues to trace patterns over the lines of Foggy’s jacket.

Foggy sighs. “It doesn’t bear repeating.”

Matt takes his hand away from Foggy’s back to start putting on the shirt. Foggy immediately feels its loss. “That bad?”

Foggy just nods, then realizes his mistake and says “Yeah.”

Foggy listens as Matt finishes buttoning the shirt and then puts on the jacket. “Foggy?” he begins.

“Yeah?”

“I just wanted to say thanks for helping me, with this and everything else,” he said. “I don’t know that I could have handled it without you. Today, I just--I froze. I couldn’t think. I don’t know what was wrong.”

“You were scared, and overworked. That was all. You’re fine now.”

“But what if you hadn’t been there? What if I’d had to go through that alone?”

“Don’t worry about what’s already happened, you’ll drive yourself crazy,” Foggy said, taking deep breaths to steady himself.

“But what if something like this happens again,” Matt said hesitantly, “and you aren’t there next time?”

Foggy sighed. “It won’t. It can’t. Don’t worry about it.”

“But--”

“Look, Matt,” Foggy said, standing up shakily. Staving off a wave of dizziness, he turned towards his friend. “There’s shitty stuff going down, I know, but right now you’ve got to focus,” he said, putting his hands on Matt’s shoulders. “You’re going to go to this meeting, and you’re going to blow them all away, and you’re going to show that asshole that you’re Matt Murdock and nobody fucks with you. And then,” he added, “we’re going to go home and burn his fucking jacket in effigy, because his skeezy fucking ass deserves it.”

Matt smiled tentatively. “Okay, Foggy, let’s do all of that,” he said. “But you should know for future reference that motivational speeches are a lot less fun when your breath smells like a paper factory.”

“Less fun, but not less effective, right?” Foggy said. When Matt made a noncommittal noise in response, Foggy pushed him away playfully. “Shut up, you blind bastard. Now go--do your thing. Leave me alone to wash out my mouth in peace.”

“Yes, Sir, Mr. Nelson, Sir,” Matt said with a mock salute as he turned to go. He tossed his ruined shirt in the trash, then headed for the door. He paused with his hand on the door and turned back towards Foggy. “Thanks again, Foggy. Really.”

“No problem, man. Anytime,” Foggy said. Once Matt had left, Foggy set about clearing away the bitter aftertaste of Zack’s words.


	4. Suspense

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It’s _alive_!
> 
> This chapter is titled “Suspense.” Do you wonder why? I bet you’re wondering why. (Hint: It’s not because it took so long to write.)

4.

“Now, I’m not complaining or anything,” Foggy says, watching Matt as he removes his day-old shirt to put on a new one, “but next time you’re planning on asking me to bring you a change of clothes after a walk of shame, maybe do it early enough that I don’t almost miss the train, okay?” 

Matt turns and beams at him over his shoulder as he buttons up. “This is you not complaining?”

“Nope, not complaining. I’m here, you’re here, the clothes are here, and we were all on time. But next time, you might not be so lucky unless you call me sooner. I’m not going to turn around and go back to the apartment again, not if it means being late.” He has been especially careful lately not to give Zack any excuse to follow through on his threats: since their disastrous meeting in Zack’s office two weeks ago, he has been arriving to work on time, sometimes even early—to his nocturnal roommate’s unending consternation.

“Oh, well look who’s so dedicated to work all of a sudden,” Matt teased.

“Shut up, man, it’s called being professional,” Foggy says. “I’d really rather not get fired right now, especially if it’s just so that you can preserve your dignity. Some things are more important than that.”

Matt is smiling as he tucks his shirt into his suit pants. “Come on, Foggy, they wouldn’t fire you. Landman treats you like a son.” 

“That’s an overstatement of the facts and you know it,” Foggy says. It’s true that, since the last incident, he has been doing his best to develop a good rapport with anyone who would have the power of veto over Zack—namely, Landman. Foggy is on good terms with their other boss now—but he doesn’t pretend to think that he’s any higher in his estimation than the firm’s average employee. “On the other hand,” Foggy continued, “Zack treats me like an obstacle, so. No job security for me.”

At the mention of Zack, Matt’s expression immediately sobers, and Foggy reprimands himself for his lack of tact as Matt silently finishes dressing and sits down to his work. “Sorry,” he offers. 

“Don’t worry about it,” Matt replies.

Foggy considers trying to revive the conversation: ask Matt how his date with Amanda actually went, discuss the exceptional scrumptiousness of that morning’s batch of bagels. Instead, he takes Matt’s cue and turns to the briefs he has to copy edit.

They work in companionable silence for a few hours until there is a knock at the door. Matt starts to reach for his cane, but Foggy stops him. “I’ll get it,” he says, and opens the door to reveal a harried-looking paralegal.

“Mr. Nelson?” the man confirms. “Could you please come with me? Mr. Landman has requested you. He says that the matter is rather urgent.”

“Okay, sure. Be right with you,” Foggy says, then he turns to grab his jacket. The paralegal waits impatiently in the hallway. “Do you want me to leave the door open?” he asks Matt.

“Yeah, sure,” Matt answers. 

“Okay, I’ll be back soon.”

“I won’t wait up,” Matt says, already turning back to his papers.

Foggy emerges to find the paralegal, a small blond man with a prominent brow, scowling at his watch. “Are you quite ready?” the man asked. “Let’s go.”

If Foggy were in any less trouble with the management, he might have teased the man for his rudeness; but as it was, he simply followed, matching the man’s brisk pace. However, they had not gotten far down the hallway when Foggy saw Zack rounding the corner and heading towards them. He nodded at the two of them as they passed, and Foggy nodded politely back. He turned his head, following Zack with his eyes, and watched him saunter up to their office. He knocked on the open door, then entered without waiting for a reply. Foggy’s feet immediately turned him back in the direction from which they came.

“Mr. Nelson, where are you going? Mr. Landman’s office is this way,” the beleaguered paralegal reminded him.

Foggy turned to look at him. Suddenly, he recognized the man: he was the same person who ambushed Matt last week, spilling the coffee and setting up Zack’s attempted move. A foreboding weight settled in Foggy’s chest.

“Actually, I have a lot of work to do—like, a lot of work—and I’m not sure if I have the time to see Mr. Landman right now. I really should get back to the office and get started on that.”

“Whatever you have to work on can wait—Mr. Landman specifically requested that you come see him today,” the paralegal said. “Now, in fact,” he added, looking pointedly at his watch—one far too expensive to be within the purchasing power of the typical paralegal. Foggy had a feeling that he knew where his extra pocket money came from.

“I understand, that, I really do, but I—I’m actually not feeling too well right now. I think I need to go sit down,” he said, holding his hand to his forehead as though dizzy.

“The break room is that way, Mr. Nelson,” the paralegal said, indicating the hallway to their right. “But if you are feeling unwell, perhaps it would be better for you to simply go home. If that is the case, I’m sure that Mr. Landman would understand. I’ll even walk you to the elevators, if you need help.”

“That’s really not necessary. I’m sure I would be fine if I could just sit down for a few minutes—”

“Mr. Nelson, are you being insubordinate? I know it’s not my place to say, but I’m not certain that it would be wise for you to disobey a direct order from either Mr. Landman or Mr. Zack just now.”

The awareness of Zack’s presence near Matt was calling him back towards their office like a blaring alarm; but even while distracted, he was not unaware of the implications of the man’s words. _If you interrupt them now_ , the man was saying, _you won’t be interrupting them again_. _Better to go and take care of whatever this is as quickly as possible and get back before anything can happen_.

“Alright, let’s go, then,” Foggy said, hurrying past the man to the elevator. 

He arrives at the elevator blocks well before his escort, who seems to be moving at a much more leisurely pace than before. The lights above the elevator tell him that it still has 20 more floors to go before it reaches theirs. At floor 43, six floors away from where they stand, the elevator pauses in its movement. _How long would it take for something terrible to happen?_ Foggy wondered. _Fifteen minutes? Twenty?_ Foggy notices that his foot is tapping in impatience; he shifts his weight and focuses on not betraying his restlessness. The light begins to move again. 

Finally, the doors slide open. Foggy is in such a rush to get in that he runs into a senior attorney who is coming out. He apologizes, but the man’s frown does not dissipate. When Foggy turns around and leans against the railing of the elevator, he sees his companion’s lips twist into an amused smile at his expense. Foggy wishes that he could wipe it from his face. The doors close. The elevator seems to run more slowly than ever, despite rising only one floor. Foggy checks his own watch: _11:14_.

The doors open. Foggy steps out, followed by the paralegal. Foggy makes a beeline for Landman’s secretary.

“Hello, I’m Foggy Nelson. I believe Mr. Landman wanted to see me?”

She smiles up at him. “Yes, of course, let me just check. You said your name was Nelson?”

“Yes. Franklin.”

She continues to smile politely as she checks her notes. She is a motherly type, who, Foggy remembers, has been working as Landman’s secretary for over fifteen years. Foggy struggles not to betray his impatience.

“Ah, yes, here you are,” she says. “Go right ahead, he can see you now.”

“Thank you,” he says to her, already moving towards the door. 

Landman is slow to notice his presence. Foggy enters the room fully, then closes the door behind him. His intention is to do it audibly but politely, but the shaking of his hands makes his movements unpredictable. The door closes with a sharp, jolting slam—or so it sounds to Foggy’s ears.

Landman looks up at him, and immediately a jolly smile spreads over his face. “Oh, hello, Franklin,” he says jovially. “It’s good to see you. Thank you for coming on such short notice.”

“Of course, sir. Anytime,” Foggy says, forcing a smile. He can feel the hair at the base of his neck starting to dampen with sweat. “What did you need me for?”

“Hm?” Landman says, looking up from his papers. “Oh yes. Would you mind waiting a moment? I’m afraid I wasn’t expecting you so soon. I’m almost finished with this report.”

Foggy fought to keep a smile on his face. “I actually have quite a lot of work to do myself today, sir, so if you would—”

“Nevermind that, son!” Landman said good-naturedly. “You kids these days are always moving so fast. It won’t kill you to wait a few minutes. Have a seat, I insist. I’ll only be a minute.”

Foggy sits, and he waits. He checks his watch: _11:18_. He looks out behind Landman, to the window behind him. The day is oppressively hot, but Landman still has his drapes thrown open to the sunlight, which is only just beginning to pass behind the buildings on the opposite side of the street. The room is baking, the cloying scents of warm leather and of the cinnamon candies melting in the bowl on Landman’s desk gathering in his throat like phlegm. _11:19._

Foggy’s heart seems to pound on his ribcage with each passing second. He worries his tongue incessantly against the roof of his mouth. His foot is tapping again, so he crosses his legs, then uncrosses them and recrosses them the other way. _What if something like this happens again_ , Matt had said two weeks ago, _and you’re not there next time?_

_11:20_. He had made a promise to Matt that he would keep him safe. He caught himself raising his hand to his mouth, ready to indulge the old bad habit of chewing his nails. Instead, he interlocked the fingers of his hands, sweaty-palmed, and without conscious thought, began to move his thumbs back and forth. He had made a promise. What if he had already broken it? What if he had already waited too long? _11:21_.

Landman had rows of bookshelves along the walls, many of them dedicated to old case files and law books. There are a few different dictionaries, a writer’s reference. Foggy spots a well-loved copy of Thurgood Marshall lying on top of the shelf, as though it had been recently consulted. 

Foggy shivered despite the heat of the room, then stood. “Sir, I’m very sorry, but I really have to—”

“Sit down, Franklin! Goodness, boy, you do need to calm yourself down.” He capped his pen, and straightened his papers. “I’m all finished now, so why don’t you just sit down and we can have our chat.” Foggy lacked the presence of mind to try to look appropriately mollified as he returned to his seat. 

Landman resumed his paternal smile. “Patience is a wonderful asset to cultivate, especially in this profession of ours. What are the lawyer’s two most important tools? Truth and justice? History and the law? No: patience and diligence. If you ever have the chance to watch Mr. Zack in court, you might realize just how important those two things are in any case you’re working. I don’t know that I’ve ever met a man with more patience, or with better instincts for timing.”

Foggy smiled, laboriously separating his woolen tongue from a palate desiccated by heat and worry. “Of course, Sir. What did you need me for?”

Landman’s ebullient smile fades slightly, becoming less energetic, but not less fond. “Well, Mr. Nelson—or can I call you Foggy?” Foggy nods stiffly. Landman smiles again. “Foggy—I hope that you have been enjoying your time here so far. We always prefer to select interns from my _alma mater_ , for professional reasons as well as personal. Interns from Columbia are, at least in my estimation, capable of things we could never ask of students from other institutions.” Despite having lived in New York for at least 40 years, Landman’s southern accent was still thick. His vowels crawled laboriously from the passage of his vocal cords elongated by more serious deformities than any Foggy had ever heard. Surreptitiously, he checked his watch again— _11:25_. “Every year, it seems that the applications get more and more competitive—so believe me when I say that you and Mr. Murdock were not selected by accident. I remember that he wrote his personal statement about Thurgood Marshall, and never once mentioned his blindness. Of course, his grades and recommendations had already distinguished him; but the fact that he was able to make a case for himself without mentioning something that, for most people, would be a defining attribute, a God-given personal statement topic—that really impressed me. And he’s certainly lived up to our expectations: I was personally unable to attend the presentation he gave, but Mr. Zack assures me that it was a thing of beauty.” Foggy’s throat constricted, his thirst imbuing the action with a prickly, wincing pain. “And then, of course, there was you. What really grabbed us about you, even more than your impeccable records, was your sheer _goodness_. Every page of your application demonstrated the sort of unselfish consideration and grounded idealism that we hardly ever see among people your age, especially in our proud but often austere profession. Seeing you in action here only confirmed that impression—it has been years since I’ve seen such honest enthusiasm about our work, or such open friendliness to people at every point in the firm’s hierarchy. That you and Mr. Murdock turned out to already be close friends when you arrived made our choices seem even better, as though it was the Lord himself guiding our hands.” His gaze, warmer than the sun streaming in behind him, returned to Foggy’s. “Mr. Nelson—Foggy—I think that it was no accident that you and Mr. Murdock came to us this summer; but I do believe that it would be a serious error to let our association end in the Fall. We would like to offer you—both of you—positions as junior attorneys here at the firm, contingent upon your graduation in the spring.”

By now, Foggy was covered in a cold sweat. A part of him—the part of him that still remembered the original logic of accepting these positions—recognized that he should be jumping up and down in excitement at this offer, and observed his revulsion with fatalistic detachment. “Uh,” he managed to croak out. “That’s—well. I don’t—um. Thanks?” Landman’s gaze was amused. Foggy cleared his throat. “I, um—I don’t know what to say. I mean, what I mean is, I’ll need to talk to Matt first. We have to—um. Discuss our future plans.”

Landman smiled again. “Well of course you do! I didn’t expect an answer this very minute, Foggy. Go talk it over with your friend, and let us know what you decide. There’s no rush.” He paused, and smiled in the direction of a picture on his desk. “You know, I find it just incredibly comforting that you two are so close to one another. You don’t find too many friends like the two of you these days. Young people have trouble getting that close to one another anymore. Actually, the two of you are so close, it almost reminds me of me and my wife—before she was my wife, of course. Not that I mean to accuse y’all of nothing—and not that it would be a problem if there was anything.” Landman chuckled at himself. “I just mean that you’re so close that it’s impossible to be selfish, because you might as well be the same person. I know that most of the other interns we’ve had would have jumped on this offer without a second thought; but the very fact that you do need to think about it is exactly why we need you here. Patience and diligence, that’s what we need. But loyalty, consideration, and enthusiasm certainly don’t hurt none!”

Foggy nodded and smiled, trying to allow Landman’s gregarious joviality to infect his own features. “Yeah, right. Loyalty and enthusiasm, that’s me!” he said, giving his arm a little swing.

Landman smiled at him for a moment more, the sunlight still streaming into the room as though no time had passed between Foggy’s entrance and the present. It took a conscious effort not to look at his watch for the time. “Well, I suppose I should let you get back to your work now—and let my work get back to me! Do let us know what you and Mr. Murdock decide on, and in the meantime, we’ll go through the motions of getting the positions approved, in case you do decide to stay on.”

“Alright. Thank you, Sir,” Foggy said, rising and preparing to leave with the least amount of undue haste he could muster. As he stood, he felt beads of sweat rolling down his legs and back. He grabbed the handle of the door and closed it behind him, careful not to let it slam as it had before. Then, safely out of sight of his employer, he hurried to the elevator bay. 

He hammered several times on the down button, muttering tacit encouragement under his breath. He looked up at the display, seeing that the elevator was hovering around the 20th floor. He cursed, looked at his watch— _11:31_ —and turned the corner towards the staircase. He hurtled down the stairs to the lower floor as quickly as he could, emerging onto the office floor and heading in the direction of their office. 

He turned the last corner just in time to see Zack emerge from the room. Two pairs of eyes—one sneering, one glaring—met as they passed. Foggy broke eye contact first, then turned into the office, closing the door quickly behind him. “Matt?” he said, turning to face his friend.

“I’m fine, Foggy, we just talked,” Matt said, anticipating his concern. “The door was open the whole time.”

Foggy let out a breath and fell into his chair, his body sagging in relief. Matt’s face was drawn up in concern as he directed his attention to his beleaguered friend. “Are you okay Foggy? You sound like you just ran a marathon.”

Foggy giggled nervously, removing the cap from a bottle of water. “Yeah, that’s sort of how it feels, too,” he said as he took a long, deep drink from the bottle. “I—It’s just that I saw him going in as I was leaving, and the whole time I was with Landman, all I could think about was that I had left you here alone.”

Matt’s lips turned downward and he looked away—one of the many tells Foggy had identified for when Matt was feeling guilty. “I’m sorry,” he said, “but there was nothing to worry about. Like I said, we just talked. The door was open. Nothing happened.”

Having calmed down a bit now, Foggy took a moment as he drank to assess his friend’s appearance more closely. The amount of tension in his body, especially around his jaw, was definitely alarming, as was his nervous plucking at the upholstery of his chair. This was Matt as Foggy saw him during midterms and finals—stressed, worried, looking desperately for the way out. “You know last week, when I threw up?” Foggy said. “That was after ‘just talking’ to Zack. I’m not going to just let that stand as a final answer.”

The nervous movements of Matt’s hands stopped as Matt considered him—unlike usual, he didn’t turn his face towards Foggy to give the illusion of looking at him. His lips thinned, and he took a few shallow breaths. “He came to offer a promotion.”

“Right.”

“He said that—that they were thinking of offering us jobs here, after we graduate. He, um—he said some very nice things about my presentation.”

“Right. Go on.”

Matt sank forward in his chair, resting his arms on his knees without releasing any tension from his shoulders and back. He reached up to run a hand through his hair. “Do—do you want to stay here, Foggy?”

“What? What does that matter?”

“This—isn’t this the reason we came here? To get jobs? Or recommendations? This is—it’s an amazing offer. Our classmates would kill for something like this.” He paused. Foggy watched him slowly twisting his hands. He finally turned his head in Foggy’s direction. “This is what you want, isn’t it? To work here, with me?”

“Okay, let me get this straight,” Foggy said, now clenching his own jaw. “He offered _you_ a job, but said that there might not be a position for me.” He clenched his fist, and tried to keep the anger out of his voice. “What would you have to do to make sure that I got an offer?”

Matt swallowed, constricting the muscles in his throat, then parted his lips— _are they as pretty wrapped around a cock?_ —and tried to speak—once, then twice. Finally, he sighed and turned his head away. “It—it um. It doesn’t—doesn’t bear repeating.”

Foggy had never hated anyone so much as he hated Zack. Seething, he turned to his desk, laid his elbow on it, and buried his hand in his hair. “I could kill him right now, I swear I could.”

“Foggy?” Matt said, finally turning his face towards his friend. It was hard to know for certain with his glasses on, but judging by the rest of his face, Foggy suspected that he was holding back tears.

Foggy sighed. “Sorry, man. This is just so fucking fucked up.” He paused to gather his thoughts. “I just met with Landman. We talked about something similar—performance review, a job offer for after graduation. I don’t remember most of it—but he said something about us. He said that we’re so close that it’s impossible to be selfish, because we’re practically the same person. That you’re even asking me about this, that you’re even thinking about it, just proves how right he was. But if it’s true, then it goes both ways, right?” he said. Matt was listening closely; some of the tension seemed to have left his shoulders. “Matt, you’re asking the wrong question. It doesn’t matter if I want to work here, because I only want to stay if you do. You’re the one who’s in danger here. It’s your choice. If you want to leave, then I will be right behind you. If you want to stay, I’ll be right here beside you. Nelson and Murdock, right? That’s all that matters to me,” Foggy concluded, feeling tears in his eyes. “So, Matt, the question to ask is: do _you_ want to stay here?”

Matt shook his head. “ _No_ ,” he said, his voice breaking.

Foggy smiled through his tears. “Then there’s your answer,” he said. “We don’t need him. We don’t need his cases. We don’t need his endorsement. Just Nelson and Murdock, Avocados at Law.”

Matt sat back up and smiled shakily back at him. “Nelson & Murdock. Our own practice.”

“That’s right. No bosses to push us around. No shitty cases keeping poor people down.”

“But no fresh bagels in the mornings, either.”

“Matt, my friend, some things in life are more important than bagels.” 

Matt’s smile widened. “Thanks, Foggy.”

Foggy smiled back, pausing as he waited for the right moment. _Patience and diligence_. “What makes you think I was talking about you?”

  
Matt just laughed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There should be two more chapters and an epilogue. Here's hoping the next update doesn't take as long as the last one!


	5. Ultimatum

5.

Two weeks from the end of their internships, Foggy began to number the days. With childlike fervor, he started counting each day that passed without incident as a victory, as that much less time for Zack to take action. They spent the first half of the week in much the same way as they had spent every week before: copies, coffees, research. On Thursday, he and Matt visited Landman’s office to officially decline his offer of employment; the next day, they spent the morning sitting in on a pre-trial for a case so egregiously unjust that it left them both absolutely convinced that they had made the right choice. Foggy was almost ready to count the day—and the week—another success when, later that afternoon, he is called into Zack’s office.

Zack keeps him waiting for nearly ten minutes outside his door—a classic power play—and Foggy makes the most of the time, steeling his nerves for what is to come. He tries to prepare for the worst: Zack trying to provoke him again, saying disgusting things to cause Foggy to make a menace of himself, allowing Zack to safely dismiss his biggest obstacle. Foggy looks down at his hands. He had gained a lot of practice lately in suppressing anger: he found that the easiest place for him to start the process was with his hands. The first sign that he was angry was always the clenching of his fists; willing his hands to relax, a finger at a time, also encouraged his temper to relax, giving him the ability to plan an appropriate response. Foggy clasps his hands together to keep from fidgeting. They are so close to escaping unscathed, to getting through the summer with nothing more than a little undue stress, that Foggy doesn’t want to think about the harm another outburst could cause. So instead, he thinks about going back to school in the fall. He and Matt were planning on staying in the same apartment, which was closer to campus than to the office. They would have to begin serious preparations for the bar exam not long after they returned to class. Marci would be working somewhere by then, who knows where—he hoped that they would be able to stay close. They hadn’t seen each other for months, and he was starting to get worried that things wouldn’t be the same when they finally got back together again. Her job would probably take up a good deal of her time, and studying for the bar would definitely take up most of his. Would they be too distracted to give their relationship the effort it would need? Then again, maybe being so busy would help give the time that they would be able to have together the air of a special treat. And maybe her having an apartment to herself would mean more opportunities to—

Finally, he was allowed to enter. He went in, deliberately slowing his breaths.

“You wanted to see me, Sir?” he called as he entered.

“Yes. Please, Mr. Nelson, sit down.”

Closing the door behind him, Foggy entered the oppressive darkness of the room. He sat down on one of the leather chairs before the desk. Zack did not look up from the form he was working on for another few minutes; Foggy tried to remember the last place he had seen Matt. He focused on keeping his hands still.

Finally, Zack signed the bottom of the form, capped his pen, and put the form aside. Folding his hands, he turned his attention to Foggy. “Well, Mr. Nelson, let’s get right to it, then.

“The current time—” he said, looking at his watch, “—is 3:42. Before five o’clock—about an hour and fifteen minutes from now—you will send Mr. Murdock up here to see me.”

Foggy swallowed, suddenly uneasy. He straightened out his fingers. “And why would I do that?”

Zack smiled. “You will do this because if you do not, you will have been expelled from Columbia before you finish up your time here.” The room began to feel cold. “You see, every year Mr. Landman, as a distinguished alumnus, is invited to dine with the dean of the Law School, and every year he insists that I come along. We always have these meetings during the summer, while we have their students in our employ, and discussion of our interns’ performance is always on the menu. Needless to say, this dinner can have massive ramifications for the careers of these interns, for better or worse. However, never before have I been faced with an intern whose behavior is as egregious as yours. Threats of violence, insubordination...truly enough to raise serious questions about the wisdom of the institution’s continuing its association with you, to say nothing of what it implies about your qualifications for the profession.” Foggy’s hands were clenching; his throat was tight. _Relax,_ he thought. _You can figure this out if you relax._ “Now, I would truly prefer not to have any part in such unsavory business, and so, I am offering you one last chance to prove yourself to me.” Zack stood up and walked around to lean against the front of his desk, directly in front of Foggy. Foggy stared down at the fists in his lap, willing them to disappear. “Send me Mr. Murdock this afternoon, and I will forget all about your little outburst. Dean Mattheson will never have to know. But if you choose to disobey, then you may have to forget all about your chance of becoming a lawyer in this city.”

Zack leaned towards him and put a hand on his shoulder, as though in comfort. Foggy jumped at the contact and, for a brief moment, he is looking into Zack’s victorious face. He has the wild urge to throw his trembling fists straight into Zack’s eerie blue eyes, his sharp nose, his smirking mouth. He looked away again, tightened his jaw, did not try to tear Zack’s head from his shoulders. “Say whatever you need to say to get him here. Even tell him the truth, if you like. Just do it now, before the end of the day, and I promise that I won’t bother either of you again. This will be the end of our little game.”

Foggy’s breaths cut the air like knives. “You think this is a game?” he asked. 

Zack smiled. “What else would you call it? I must say, it has been an honor to try my wit against yours. None of my other games has been nearly so diverting as this one, and I have you to thank for that. But every match must eventually come to its end, and I’m afraid it’s time for you to step down and deliver the prize.”

Every one of Foggy’s limbs felt heavy; his hands were shaking despite his attempts to steady them. He could feel sobs gathering like storm clouds at the back of his throat, but no tears came to his eyes. 

“Now, Mr. Nelson, you have about an hour left. I would suggest that you go now. The sooner you start the process, the sooner all this can be over.”

After a moment, Foggy stood on unsteady legs. Unable to find his voice, he left without saying anything. His body was moving as if on its own while his mind raced on unchecked: _Can he be lying? Can I afford to risk that? How can I be sure he isn’t bluffing? What will I do if he’s not? What will I do if he_ is _?_

_What do I tell Matt?_

Suddenly, he found himself at the door of their office. _What if Matt’s inside? Am I ready to see him yet?_ He put out his hand to turn the doorknob, fumbling for an innocuous greeting, bracing himself to see Matt inside; but when he opened the door, Matt was not there. Foggy closed the door behind him and went over to sit at his desk.

He cast his eyes over their room, over the little expressions of his and Matt’s personalities that had slowly accumulated around their shared workspace. Most of the decorations, such as they were, were his own; Matt didn’t have much desire or need for them. He had brought in his dinosaurs, the colorful toys that had been slipped into his bags by a toddler cousin while his family was helping pack for his freshman year. He had been the first kid in this generation of the Nelson family to go to a residential college, and so most of the family had taken it upon themselves to offer every kind of help they could. It had meant that the job was finished a lot more quickly; it also meant that Foggy had inherited a lot of things that he had never planned to take to school. Of all of these things—the three ratty old beach towels he had still never used, the can opener that couldn’t cut tinfoil, a sizeable collection of doilies—his favorite was the jar of fantastically colored dinosaurs donated by that little cousin, who was now almost ten years old. On a whim while he was unpacking, he had put them up all over their dorm room, and they had proved an unexpected source of joy. They had a tendency to migrate positions whenever a visitor stopped by; finding one in a new place never failed to bring a smile to his face. Foggy thought that even Matt enjoyed them on occasion: he had once seen him holding one in his hands, tracing the shapes of the hard plastic to conjure an image of the tiny creature in his mind. 

Since they had come with him to the firm, the figurines had remained static, marching in eternal single file across the partition between his desk and Matt’s. Foggy took one in his hand now, running his fingers over it the way he imagined Matt might, trying to see it from his perspective.

That was how Matt found him a few minutes later. Foggy jolted from his troubled thoughts when Matt opened the door, alerting his friend to his presence.

“Hey, Foggy, I was looking for you,” Matt said. He was smiling; the last week, with Zack’s looming specter apparently driven off, had been good for him. Some of the tension he had been unconsciously carrying around the office was slowly leaving him; he was relaxed, easy, and quick to smile in a way Foggy hadn’t seen him for weeks. 

Foggy cleared his throat, set down his green dinosaur, and tried to steady his voice. “Hey,” he said simply.

Matt’s smile faltered. “Foggy? Is everything okay?”

God, was he so pitiful that Matt pick up on it from just one word? He took another deep breath. “Yeah, everything’s fine. Don’t worry about it.”

Matt waited a moment, his head cocked attentively, before turning and closing the door behind him. He set down his cane in its corner, felt for his chair, and pulled it around the desks so that it was facing Foggy. He sat down in it, maintaining his distance but keeping close enough that Foggy could reach for him if necessary. 

“Foggy?” he said, his tone coaxing. “What happened?”

Foggy twitched. “Nothing. Nothing happened.”

Matt kept his face carefully impassive behind his glasses. “Foggy, you know you can tell me anything, right?”

Foggy’s breath left him in a long, tense exhale. “You—you know how my Mom wanted me to be a butcher?” He half expected Matt to withdraw at that, to shake his head in frustrated consternation at the oft-told tale. Instead, he just nodded, his features still immobile. “I—I mean, I joke about it, but I never really thought about going through with that. I mean, I worked in a grocery store for a couple of summers in High School, but—I always... I mean, it was fine. I got to talk to people, help them find things, but at the end of the day, I just felt—I wanted to never go back. By the end of the summer, I could barely live with it. It was like suffocating, doing the same thing every day without anything to look forward to except going home, and then knowing I would have to turn around and come back and do it all again. I couldn’t even handle three months of that job, but I—“ Foggy swallowed. “What if I have to go back? What if I have to go be a butcher?” 

Matt’s arm jumped from his side, as though he wanted to reach out, but thought better of it. Instead, he reached up to take off his glasses. “Foggy, you don’t have to be a butcher.”

“How can you know that?”

Matt’s dark eyes smiled, soft and encouraging. “Because, you’re going to be a great lawyer. I mean—you’re smart enough to do anything you put your mind to, but—but you’re also _good_ , Foggy. You want to help people, and I mean more than just pointing them to the turkey that’s on sale. And you—you’re so good with words. Not just the arguing, but just— _talking_ to people. Helping them. You—people trust you, Foggy, and that’s—that’s what’s going to make you a great lawyer. I—every day, I’m inspired by you. To do better, to _be_ better, so that when we finally get out of here, we can really be the best damn avocados this city’s ever seen.” Matt was still smiling, so goddamn sweet that Foggy ached with it. He reached out, slowly, tacitly asking permission before taking Foggy’s hand in his own. “Nelson  & Murdock, right? We’re going to get out of here and show them all how wrong they were to mess with us.”

About halfway through his speech, the first tears began to breach Foggy’s defenses. _Fuck it_ , he thought. _Is it really worth losing all of that over a stupid—over this?_ Sobs broke over him, wracking his frame and causing him to tighten his grip on Matt’s hand. _It’s not just my career he’s threatening. He’s threatening Nelson & Murdock. He’s threatening _us.

Matt’s free hand rose to join his other in cradling Foggy’s. The smile had vanished from his face, replaced by concern and confusion. Foggy could see the tears starting to come into his eyes, too. “F—Foggy—Foggy, I— _please_. Tell me what’s wrong,” he pleaded. 

_It would be so easy,_ Foggy thought. _I wouldn’t even have to ask him. I could just tell him what Zack told me, and he’d go up there and do it. It would be his choice, not mine. One hour, that’s all it would take. One awful hour in exchange for a whole career together._

Now Matt was crying, too, tears rolling down his cheeks. “Please. Let me help you,” he begged, shifting his whole body closer to Foggy in entreaty.

 _I need you to go upstairs_ , he wanted to say. _If you don’t, I’ll be expelled, I’ll be finished, we’ll be ruined before we start._ The words caught in his throat. He tried to breathe, to relax, but the words wouldn’t come. They burned at the back of his throat like vomit.

Finally, he managed to force something out. “No,” he said. “No, I—I can’t—”

Matt’s brow was still furrowed; his mouth hung open, ready to offer reassurance or commiseration as necessary. He drew one of his hands away, stood, and pulled Foggy up into an embrace. “It’s okay,” he whispered, one arm rubbing across Foggy’s back and the other squeezing their joined hands. “We’re almost there. Just one more week now. We’ll make it. It’ll be alright.”

Foggy didn’t stop crying. It wouldn’t be alright, because there was no way he was going to bring himself to sell Matt up the river. There was no way he was going to be able to stop Zack from following through on his threats. He knew what would happen next: Matt would calm him down, eventually, and then he would walk him home. He would cook him one of the quick-and-dirty, terrible-for-you meals that Foggy always kept on hand for a rainy day, the ones that Matt always said he could smell in the apartment for days afterwards. He would let Foggy drink the beer they could barely afford, and he would tell every joke and story he knew to cheer him up, even though it would be exhausting for him to try. And Foggy would go, would eat, would drink and laugh and pretend he didn’t notice when Matt’s smile started to fray at the edges. 

And the whole time, he would just be waiting for the hammer to fall.

It was five thirty by the time Foggy had calmed down enough to leave. Part of him was glad that he had missed his chance for second thoughts; part of him was desperate to make sure that Zack hadn’t left yet.

Matt pulled away, slowly, keeping his hand on Foggy’s shoulder. “You okay?” he asked.

Foggy didn’t try to force a smile. “Yeah. I’m fine.” He turned, pulling his hand out of Matt’s, to pick up the glasses from the desk. “Let’s just go home,” he said, handing them over to Matt.

Matt’s eyes were uncertain, questioning; but he took the glasses and put them on. Foggy looked at himself in the reflection and hated what he saw. 

“Okay,” Matt said, turning to gather his things. “Let’s go.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just one more chapter and the epilogue to go: I _will_ finish this before the summer is over!
> 
> If you’re looking for something else to read between updates, consider checking out my new oneshot, “Mercy.” Fair warning: it’s very very angsty. But if that were a problem, you wouldn’t be here, would you?


	6. Storm

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Surprise! It was a 5 + 1 fic _the whole time!_

1.

On Saturday, it was all Foggy could do to put thoughts of imminent expulsion from his mind, despite Matt’s best efforts to wear a brave face and pull Foggy out of his head. Not even a trip to Josie’s could cure Foggy of his depression. Eventually, he began forcing himself to smile and laugh, so that Matt might start to look less upset. If anything, it was like Matt could hear how false his laughter rang, which only made him more concerned. By the end of the day, he was utterly exhausted.

On Sunday, melancholy replaced his dread. He flirted with acceptance, imagining what he might be able to do if he were expelled. It would not be the end of the world. There were law programs elsewhere. He would have other options. Matt would wait for him.

By Wednesday, acceptance had given way to hope. Maybe Zack had been bluffing, after all: he _had_ chosen wisely. Nothing would come of Zack’s promises.

On Friday, the last day of their internships, Foggy wakes much earlier than usual, bewitched by the prospect of finally being free. While the first pot of coffee is brewing, he has the brilliant idea to include Matt in his celebratory early-morning vigil. Without pausing to consider the notion, he starts tiptoeing towards Matt’s room. Soundlessly, he opens the door and creeps through the low, grey light admitted by Matt’s tenement-view window. He has just discerned the shape of the bed when a hand finds his shoulder.

“Boo,” Matt says, and Foggy shouts and jumps away. Matt laughs as Foggy hits his knee against the bedframe, but promptly offers his hand to help Foggy up. “Sorry, Foggy. Are you okay?”

“No. I am most definitely not okay. I think I tore my meniscus, you asshole.”

“I…really don’t think you did,” Matt says. “You sure you’re not imagining things?”

“Shut up, I’m still in pain.” Foggy looks over to Matt’s desk, where he can make out the shapes of a few books. “I was coming to wake you up, but I guess you’ve been up for a while already.”

“Yeah, a little bit,” Matt says. He sounds exhausted. He walks over towards the door and feels around for the light switch. The old lamp that came with the apartment flickers noticeably when it turns on. Matt is already dressed, complete with glasses. It is difficult to get a read of his expression with the glasses on, but his posture is a good bit less erect than usual.

“Are you doing okay, buddy? You look like you didn’t sleep too well.”

“I’m fine, Foggy. It was just a bit noisy, is all.”

Foggy blinked. He had heard nothing unusual last night—maybe a siren or two, but nothing that should have surprised someone who had lived in the city as long as Matt. “Really? Huh. I didn’t notice anything.”

“It’s fine. Don’t worry about it. What I want to know is why _you’re_ up so early. Normally I can’t get you to move before 8:30.”

“How could I _not_ get up early for our last day as the lackeys of the scum on the boot of corporate America? It’s like Christmas morning! I couldn’t sleep in any longer. Are you sure _that_ wasn’t what was keeping you up?”

Matt smiled thinly. “Yes, I’m sure it was just my excitement over a day full of mandatory elbow-rubbing with ‘the scum of corporate America’ that kept me awake. After all, what’s not to look forward to about that?”

“Spoil sport,” Foggy scoffed. “But just think about after that: nine more hours and we’ll be free of Zack and his stupid little mind games forever.”

Matt’s smile widened. “Well, there is that. It’ll also be our last chance to pick up free bagels.”

“Oh, right! Thanks for reminding me! I need to bring a box with me for my stash. The bagels I get today are going to have to last us until we graduate, pass the bar, get our own offices, _and_ establish a wealthy clientele.”

Matt laughed. “Get a big box. And don’t leave it where I can smell it.”

They took their time getting ready, as they had very little reason or desire to rush into work. Matt asked if they might walk instead of taking the subway, but Foggy looked up at the dark clouds hanging in the sky and decided that, for the sake of their suits, it would probably be safer to take the underground route. Matt sighed—he hated the subway, and Foggy knew it—but he trusted Foggy’s judgment.

Two stations away from their destination, several passengers debarked, and Foggy was startled to feel Matt jump beside him. “What’s wrong?” he asked.

“Nothing,” Matt answered, too quickly. His cheeks were emblazoned with red. “It was nothing.” He turned around, subtly orienting himself so that his back was facing away from most of the people on the train.

Foggy gritted his teeth, but said nothing. This was hardly the first time that he had seen Matt get groped on the subway. However, since the business with Zack got started, Foggy had been growing more and more annoyed by it. He wondered if this sort of thing had anything to do with why Matt hated the subway so much.

Matt must have noticed the shift in his mood, and so he began to talk about how he was having trouble tracking down braille editions of some course materials for their last year of law school. Foggy let out some of his frustration by helping Matt create detailed plans to charge every professor who had ever wronged them with discrimination. By the time they left the subway, twenty minutes later, they had both forgotten their discomfort.

Once they had arrived at the office, they set about the business of closing up shop. A fair few people stopped by to wish them well, mainly paralegals, with the occasional pining secretary or two. They still had a few copies to make and a few errands to run, but for the most part their day was spent tying up loose ends.

At around three o’clock, another paralegal stops by while Matt is out running an errand. 

“Hey, Foggy. Packing up?” says the woman, a petite blonde Foggy cannot remember having seen before.

“Yep. It’s our last day.”

“Oh, I’m sorry to hear that,” she says perfunctorily. “The bosses want to see you upstairs.”

Foggy dumps the dinosaurs he had been gathering into their jar. “Okay. Should I wait for Matt, so that we can go together?”

“No, I don’t think it matters.”

Foggy casts a measuring glance at her expression—utterly disinterested—before agreeing. “Okay, I’ll be right there.” That he and Matt did not need to go up together meant that meeting separately could be exactly what Zack wants: Foggy is glad that at least they found him first, so that he can run reconnaissance. If it looks suspicious at all, then he can make certain that Matt knows to be wary. He follows the paralegal to the elevators, then rides up to the next floor alone.

Upon his arrival in Landman’s office, he can barely recognize the space. Every other time he had been here, sunlight had been streaming through the windows, granting the room a sticky, warm glow. Now, though, with the ponderous clouds still hanging low in the sky, the room was practically funereal, its confines nearly as dark as those of its partner next door.

Landman greets him warmly, while Zack is more reticent. What follows is an utterly innocuous exchange that leaves Foggy bored rather than worried.

“We’re very sad to see you go—I must admit, it has been a real pleasure working with you, son. And Mr. Murdock, as well, of course.”

“It will be truly a shame to see you leave.”

“You’re sure there’s no way we can convince you to take the jobs? We’d certainly much rather have you working with us than against us.”

“Who knows? Someday the two of you might run us out of business.”

It was all very nice, and very safe. Foggy nods, laughs, and looks reluctant to leave in all the right places. He shakes both of their hands in turn, gently but definitively restates his refusal of their generous offer, and goes on his merry way. He finds Matt cleaning in the office when he returns.

“Hey, Matt, the bosses want to see you upstairs.”

Matt freezes, the lid of a box still in his hands. “Just me?”

“Yeah. They just finished talking to me. They want you next.”

“…Is it safe?”

“I think so? I mean, at least as far as anything we do here is. They’re in Landman’s office, and he’ll be there the whole time, so I really don’t think that Zack will try anything.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah, pretty much.” 

“And you’re sure we can trust Landman?”

Foggy paused to consider that for a moment. Every time he had spoken to Landman, he had gotten the same impression that he had whenever he saw his father deal with clients: trustworthy, professional, friendly. “I think that we can trust him,” Foggy concludes. “He seems like good people, or at least as good as corrupt corporate lawyers can be. I think he’s safe.” Matt still does not move. “You can probably get away with not going, though, if you’re worried.”

Matt seems to consider his options for a moment. Finally, he sets down the lid of the box. “Okay. I’ll just go get it over with,” he says, retrieving his cane from its corner. As he opens the door, he stops to smile back towards Foggy. “Send in the rescue teams if I’m not back in fifteen minutes.”

Foggy smiles back. “Will do,” he says with a salute Matt cannot see.

As it turns out, Foggy is not there to see Matt come back—he gets pulled away from the office for nearly an hour by one of the attorneys he had been assisting, who wants to review all of the materials Foggy had been collecting. Of course, they had to end the exchange with the obligatory series of insincere goodbyes. Yes, I am going back to school. No, I don’t plan to come back. Yes, it really is too bad.

Foggy was getting sick of it. He could only imagine how Matt must be feeling, since he had been dreading it before it even started. He was itching to get out of that office. His impatience mounted as he waited to finally be released from the senior attorney’s custody. He was just beginning to plan his escape when the attorney released him of his own accord. 

Foggy didn’t need to be told twice.

By the time he finally made it back to the office, the promised hour had come, and Matt had already finished packing up the last of their meagre possessions. 

“You beautiful, beautiful man!” Foggy says as he enters. “You didn’t have to clean up my side of the room.”

Matt looked up from the floor, startled by Foggy’s arrival. “It was no problem,” he said in a small voice. “You were busy.”

“Well, thank you anyways,” Foggy says, picking up the few stray dinosaurs and empty coffee cups that Matt had missed. “This means that we get to leave that much sooner! If we hurry, we might be able to beat the rain and save our suits.”

“Okay,” Matt said. He stood up slowly from his seat and picked up his box with his left hand while holding his cane in his right.

He still looks tired. Foggy is going to have to have a chat with their neighbors if this keeps up. “Here, let me get that,” he says, taking Matt’s box and placing it on top of his own before picking them both up at once.

“Foggy, you don’t have to do that.”

“No, it’s fine. You packed them, I carry them. It’s not like we have anything heavy in here, anyway. Like, I’m pretty sure my box is mostly bagels.”

“I should carry something, though, at least,” Matt said, an indignant look on his face. Foggy was always surprised at what he chose to get angry about.

“Okay, then. Here, take these,” Foggy says, setting the boxes down and handing Matt the coffee cups. “You can throw them in the trash while we walk out the door of this place for the last time ever. Now come on, let’s go! I can barely wait to be out of here,” he proclaims, picking up the boxes again.

Matt’s mouth twitched, almost a smile. “Well, when you put it that way.”

Foggy does not think to ask about meeting the bosses until they have already left behind the not-so-hallowed halls of the venerable firm L&Z. “It was fine,” Matt said, focused on keeping himself from tripping on the uneven sidewalks. “Just the usual. Like you said.” 

“Great,” Foggy replies. “Glad to hear it.”

The sky looks even more ominous than it did when they left in the morning. Foggy resents the universe for taking that much glory away from their first afternoon as free men. If this turns out to be more than just a quick summer storm, it could put a damper on his plans for the night. Walking all the way to Josie’s in a downpour is not Foggy’s idea of an appropriate celebration. 

He is so distracted by the state of the weather that he is already halfway into the subway entrance by the time he notices that Matt had not followed him down the stairs.

“Hey, what’s up?” he asks, turning back up towards where Matt stands poised, framed against the dark sky, the wind pulling at his jacket like a pair of searching hands. 

“Foggy,” Matt began tentatively. “Would it be okay if we walked? I have a bit of a headache.”

Foggy huffs out a short laugh. “Hey, so, I know you can’t see them, but there are these huge black storm clouds that have been hanging over the city all day? You can probably tell from the wind that they’re almost ready to blow, right?” Foggy argues. “I mean, I’d normally be happy to walk, but I sort of need this suit, you know?”

Matt swallowed, the hand holding his cane coming up to his chest. “What about a taxi? Can we take a taxi?”

“Did you bring money for a taxi?”

“I’ll pay you back.”

“What? That’s not—“ Foggy sighs, and adjusts the boxes in his arms. “Come on, Matt, this is silly. It’s not too late to catch the 5:30 train,” He goes back up the stairs to offer Matt his shoulder. Up close, he can see that Matt’s face is pale and drawn, the muscles of his jaw tense. He holds his cane like a lifeline, subtly curling his body around it. “Matt? Are you doing okay?”

Matt jumped at the sound of his voice. “What? Yes, I’m fine,” he said. He squared his shoulders and took Foggy’s arm. “Let’s go. 5:30 train, right?”

“Yeah,” Foggy says, unable to take his eyes away from his friend’s strained smile. “Here are the stairs.”

As they descended underground, Matt’s forced enthusiasm quickly bled away. His reaction was much more pronounced than the usual disorientation his claustrophobia produced. They enter the subway car, taking places in the middle of the car near the doors. Matt’s expression becomes as dark and obscure as the clouds outside. Foggy feels his mouth go dry.

“Hey,” Foggy says as he bumps Matt’s shoulder with his own, as gently as he can. Matt jumped anyway. “Are you sure you’re doing okay, buddy?”

Matt forced the corners of his mouth to turn upwards from their frown. “I’m fine, Foggy.”

Foggy’s heart sinks low in his stomach. “Okay,” he says. He will let it go without argument for now: the subway was hardly the appropriate place to ask the questions that had begun to claw at the walls of his mind. He turned towards the window of the car and watched the walls of the tunnel give way to the dingy platform and impassive faces of the next stop.

 _I told him he would be safe,_ Foggy thought as the other passengers brushed past him to get off the train. _Why did I think that it would be—_

Suddenly, a cracking sound and a shouted profanity interrupt his thoughts. He whirls around to find Matt standing ashen-faced and frozen above the body of a young man whose hands were cradling his broken nose.

“The fuck!?” said the man on the floor.

“I’m—I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” Matt said, backing away.

“Don’t apologize. He deserved it,” said a blue-haired young woman sitting behind them.

“I’m sorry,” Matt repeated, but this time he fled, running out onto the platform—the wrong one.

“Matt! Wait! Stop!” Foggy called as he ran out after him. He just managed to get out onto the platform before the doors closed on him. Matt disappeared from sight into the tunnel leading towards the street. Foggy followed. It was difficult for him to move very quickly with the boxes, and so he ended up falling behind Matt. _How did he move so fast without running into something?_ Foggy wondered. He finally found him outside the station, standing against the guardrail, head in his hands and chest heaving. 

Foggy walked tentatively over to him. “Matt?” he said. “Matty?” His voice cracked as though he was about to cry. “What’s wrong, buddy?”

Thunder rumbled overhead. “Please, Foggy. Please, can we just go home?”

“Okay,” Foggy said. Carefully, so as not to startle him again, he moved closer so that Matt could take hold of his shoulder as a guide. “Okay,” he said, swallowing. “Let’s go.” Foggy hoped that Matt could not feel him shaking.

Matt set the pace as they walked the remaining few blocks, and Foggy struggled to keep up. It was as almost as though Matt were the one leading him. 

The air pressure continued to fall as Foggy’s thoughts darkened.

_Why the hell didn’t I go up there with him? What’s wrong with me?_

They finally arrived home as the first raindrops began to fall. Matt was up the stairs and out of sight before Foggy could even begin to look for the right words to say. He heaved a sigh at the foot of the stairs, then began to climb up slowly after him. 

When he found himself outside Matt’s door, the boxes having been deposited haphazardly in the living room, he was no more prepared for the conversation than he had been on the subway.

He made himself knock, anyway.

“Matt? Are you in there? Can I come in?” Foggy called plaintively. “Please? I need to talk to you.”

Foggy waited nearly two minutes for Matt to open the door on his own. He tried the doorknob, and found it unlocked. “Matt?” he said. “I’m coming in.”

With the clouds blocking the rays of the evening sun, Matt’s room was even darker than it had been that morning. Foggy could barely make out Matt’s silhouette slumped on the edge of his bed.

“Matt?” Foggy said, approaching him. He was careful to keep talking as he walked, so that Matt could keep track of where he was. “Matt, how are you feeling? Is your headache any better?” He stepped up next to Matt where he was sitting on the bed. “Is it okay if I sit next to you?” he asked. Matt gave no sign that he had heard him. Foggy chose not to make assumptions, and stayed standing.

“Matt? I need you to talk to me, buddy. What happened to you today?”

Matt shifted slightly away from Foggy. Raindrops pelted the windowpane. “Nothing happened, Foggy. I just—there were just too many people. I needed to get away,” he said. “I overreacted.”

“Matt,” Foggy said as his heart rate rose. “Matt, I want to believe that you’re telling me the truth. Believe me, I really do. If you can tell me again that nothing happened, I’ll believe you. Okay? I’ll stop asking, and I’ll leave you alone. But Matt,” Foggy said, lowering himself to his knees and getting closer to Matt’s eye level, “if you’re lying, and something did happen, I need to know about it. You need to _tell_ me about it. Please, Matt,” he said, taking Matt’s hand. “I’m here for you. You can tell me anything.”

As Foggy’s eyes adjusted to the light in the room, he was able to watch the muscles of Matt’s jaw as he struggled to find the words to say. It was several minutes before he was able to speak again. Foggy waited. He would not force Matt to talk. Not today. “It was—“ he began. “I—“ His mouth snapped shut, and his hand tightened around Foggy’s. His glasses reflected the light from the window, lending it a ghastly red tinge. In the darkness of the room, they drew Foggy’s eyes like flames. Finally, Matt spoke. “Landman knew,” he choked out. “He knew all along.” 

Foggy’s hands clenched. 

Tears began to fall from beneath Matt’s glasses, shining in the ghostly light of the window. “He—he left me alone with him. He knew exactly what he was doing, and he did it anyway. He—Zack, he—he said that he was going to get you expelled if I didn’t—if I didn’t—“ Matt was shuddering violently, but Foggy had no idea if he was supposed to keep his distance or pull him close and never let go. “I couldn’t let that happen, Foggy. I couldn’t let that happen to you.” He sobbed. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

Foggy remembered what Landman had said to him, in that same office, just weeks ago: _‘You two are so close that it’s impossible to be selfish, because you might as well be the same person.’_

Foggy was a fool. He had trusted the wrong person, and it was Matt who paid the price. 

“No, Matt. I’m sorry. I should have known better. I should’ve been more careful.” His lip trembled, and bile rose at the back of his throat. “I should never have let this happen.” He could no longer tell whether he was clutching Matt’s hand or Matt his. “Matt, I—is it okay for me to hug you?”

Matt’s grip tightened. He nodded, and when Foggy climbed up to sit next to him on the bed, he immediately buried his face in Foggy’s jacket. Foggy threw the arm that wasn’t already holding Matt around his friend’s sobbing chest, rubbing soothing patterns on his back as he cried.

As Matt slowly calmed himself down, pressing his ear to Foggy’s heart, Foggy wished that he could just let things end there. He wished that he could let Matt cry it out and move on. But there was still one more thing they had to talk about—tonight, before Matt decided that they would never talk about it again.

“Matt. Matty,” he said, coaxing and apologetic. “I need you to listen to me, buddy.”

Matt just pressed his head closer to Foggy’s chest. “Don’t want to talk anymore, Foggy. I’m tired.”

“I know, buddy, but we have to talk about this now.” Matt fails to reply, so Foggy decides to keep talking. “Matt, I need you to promise me that you’re going to report it.”

Matt’s entire body tenses. “No,” he says. “No. It’s over now. We don’t ever have to go back there again. We’re done.”

“I know, Matt. I know that’s what you want. But you need to listen to me, okay?” Matt sat up and pulled off his battered and dirtied glasses to rub at his eyes. “Do you know what he did, when he did that to you? He put all the power in your hands. You know you can get him fired, or even disbarred? You could put a stop to him for good, Matt. You have the ability to do that, now.”

Matt wearily shook his head. “It wouldn’t work. Even if I did report it, Landman would back him up. He would pay off the investigators. He would do something, I don’t know, and none of it would matter. I don’t even want to think about it.”

“Matt, I can’t force you to do it. I wouldn’t do that to you, not now. But if you do nothing, then there’s nothing to stop him from doing this to someone else.” Matt closed his eyes, and more tears fell down his cheeks. “You don’t just have the ability to do this, Matt. You have the responsibility. And you know I’ll be there with you every step of the way. You won’t have to do it alone,” Foggy said, running his thumb over Matt’s knuckles. “I’ll testify, too. They won’t be able to get away with doing nothing, not if we both report it.”

Matt swallowed. Foggy could see more tears starting to well up in his eyes. “You really think we could get him?”

“Yeah, Matt. I do.” Foggy pressed Matt’s hand. “I have to.”

What little sunlight had been passing through the clouds was long gone. Foggy could no longer see his friend’s face. “Okay,” Matt said. “I’ll do it.”

Foggy reached out blindly for his shoulder to pull him into another hug. “Thank you, Matt,” he said. “And I’m sorry. I promise, I’ll never let this happen again.”

A few minutes later, after Matt fell into a doze, Foggy let himself out of the room. He made his way to the kitchen. With the percussive rhythm of the rain his only company, he pulled out the remains of their bottle of whiskey.

It was going to be a long night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...Whew! The worst is over now. Last up will be a short (?) epilogue from Matt’s POV that will tie things up and address the Daredevil of the situation.


End file.
